A few drops of ethanol, the substance contained in alcoholic beverages,can double the life expectancy of the small worm Caenorhabditis elegans, the most widely used animal model in aging studies, according to a new study by the University of California at Los Angeles published in the journalPLoS ONE.
However, if the worms are given higher concentrations of ethanol they suffer neurological damage and die. So why do tiny doses make them live 20 to 40 days instead of the 10 to 15 days that their lifespan usually lasts? The answer is not clear at the moment. “The concentration of ethanol supplied is equivalent to one tablespoon of ethanol in a bathtub full of water, or the amount of alcohol in a beer diluted in hundreds of liters of water,” explains biochemist Steven Clarke, co-author of the research. According to Clarke, it is difficult to explain why only this small concentration of ethanol can double the life expectancy of animals. In fact, they have checked if the dose is increased slightly, the beneficial effect disappears.
Identifying the biochemical process that lengthens the life of the worm in these experiments could have implications forunderstand human aging, for example helping to explain “why two glasses of wine or beer in humans reduce cardiovascular disease and increase longevity,” the study authors argue. And they already have some clues as to where to start looking. “Our molecules live for only weeks or months,” explains Clarke. “If we want to live a long time we have to make our molecules survive longer; and the best way to do it is withenzymes that repair DNAIn fact, it was in their laboratory that they identified the first repair enzymes in the 1980s.
